IP Democracy: Senators Drag Feet on Stevens Bill Vote, Citing Elections

Senator Ted Stevens (R-AK) is busy trying to get the 60 votes he needs to shut down bill-killing debate on his telecom reform legislation and is meeting opposition from surprising quarters. According to this piece by the The National Journal’s David Hatch, Pennsylvania Republican Senator Rick Santorum opposes bringing the bill up before the elections because he is caught in a tight re-election race and fears the public backlash if he votes for a bill that doesn’t contain net neutrality provisions.

More specifically, Santorum and other senators are worried about casting a sensitive vote on the inevitable pro-net neutrality amendment that will be introduced. They fear opposing such an amendment will leave them vulnerable to allegations that they helped destroy the Internet. On the other hand, if they don’t oppose the amendment, they risk losing valuable telecom industry contributions.

The upshot: Stevens’ bill stands a lower chance of being brought up for a vote in September, as the Commerce Committee chairman desires. The odds are now that the bill will be brought up in the shortened post-election session in November.

Meanwhile, Tim Lee has this op-ed piece in today’s New York Times that makes the case for how net neutrality regulations could harm competition. The editorial, which has obviously been edited for space and I suspect leaves out much of Tim’s analysis, cites “regulatory capture” and the ease of evading technological barriers as reasons why any net neutrality scheme will fail.

Update: Matt Stoller at MyDD tears into The New York Times for publishing Tim Lee’s piece. He takes a fair shot at Lee for his affiliation with what Matt calls a phony think tank, “The Show-Me Institute,” which, among other things, advocates the teaching of intelligent design in schools. He also takes a few fun but unfair shots at Lee for his name (Tim B. Lee, which sounds almost like Tim Berners Lee, one of the founders of the Internet) and his photo, which Matt finds “hilariously creepy.” But mostly he shames the New York Times op-ed staff for their willingness to accept submissions from someone who may or may not have the chops to gain such valuable exposure.

I’m stupified by the New York Times Op-Ed Editors, who have apparently decided that it’s their job to cut and paste any random submission from a ‘think tank’. Or maybe there just aren’t editors anymore, it’s all just interns due to cost-cutting.

Posted by Cynthia Brumfield on August 3, 2006 8:42 AM to IP Democracy